Empowering professional women through reproductive stages. Addressing work-life challenges, protections, and guidance.
Your Rosa Parks Moment
If you're going to have your Rosa Parks moment, make it count. Make sure you document, document, document the complaint, and all follow up to the boss, to the HR department. Whatever happens, put it in writing. Hold their feet to the fire. Stand up for yourself. The Rosa Parks moment, Circa 2018 in the workplace.
Happy July 4th! Paid Maternity Leave Finally a Reality in NY!
Here’s one thing all pregnant working women in the United States now have in every State in the Union, and that’s the right not to be treated differently, not to experience hostility, backlash, a diminution, a degradation to the terms or the conditions or the privileges of your employment because of your pregnancy, because of your childbirth, or because of a related medical condition.
Lactation and Work: Your Rights
if your company has at least 50 employees, you are covered for up to a year after your baby is born, you are permitted, and they are required to create, make this space for you to express milk and continue lactating during working hours. Unpaid time, but they can't discriminate and they must permit you to do so. If your employer does not have 50 employees, approximately half of the states in the United States have their own lactation laws such as in New York, and Connecticut, where I practice law - both of those laws go farther than the federal law in protecting women who are lactating.
Pregnancy Discrimination: What to do?
Pregnancy discrimination in the workplace is illegal, but it happens all the time. So you need to be proactive. It’s not as if your company’s gonna grow a heart, all of a sudden.
Sex Discrimination Makes Me Mad, How About You?
If you are a woman being paid less than a man, or treated worse than you should be treated at work because you’re a woman, because you’re pregnant, because you had a baby, because you took some protected disability leave either while you were pregnant, or after your baby was born, and now you are being penalized for it, or punished for it, you have to oppose it.
NYCHRL revised May 9, 2018 to cover ALL employees in sexual harassment cases
Under the new revised statute as of May 9, 2018, even if you're the only employee, and you are being sexually harassed, being subjected to unwelcome sexual conduct, a sexually hostile work environment, you are in a position now to hold your employer accountable.
No NDA's permitted in NY
Today's video is about confidentiality. Nondisclosure agreements are no longer permitted just because your employer wishes to sweep your claim and your settlement under the rug. You, now as the victim of the sexual harassment must consent to the privacy, to the confidentiality, to the nondisclosure agreement if it is to occur.
No more mandatory, private arbitration of NY sexual harassment cases
Why this is also really big news is that federal law, the federal Arbitration Act, case law interpreting it - permits employers to require employees who are starting a job as a condition of that employment to accept the notion that you give up your right to a jury trial, you give up your right to hold your employer accountable in court in a public forum for free when, if and when, you're being discriminated against.
1099'ers are Now Covered by NY Sexual Harassment Law
If you're being sexually harassed, subjected to unwelcome sexual attention, a hostile work environment due to your sex - up until April 2018, you wouldn’t be covered if you weren't a W-2 employee.
Glamour Magazine asks Jack Tuckner: How should the average person handle sexual harassment at work?
Glamour Magazine for its Solidarity Issue of June/July 2018 reached out to Jack Tuckner, Esq. with the question — How should the average person handle sexual harassment at work?
Motherhood penalty causes gender pay disparity
If your company doesn’t correct what they are doing that is discriminatory toward you as a result of your pregnancy, which is inseparable from who you are as a woman obviously, you wanna be in a position where they would have to make you happy in the separation. If you have to get a divorce from your company, you want to be able to leave with your head held high, and your shoulders squared.
No fault attendance policies often illegally discriminate against pregnant women
It's the law, it's the federal law if your employer has 15 employees, and if you work, depending on where you work, if you work in New York State, four employees. But chances are, if you work for an employer with at least 15 employees, you’re covered and it’s illegal when your employer disciplines you, or fires you because of their no-fault policy when you are pregnant.
Connecticut Fair Employment Practices Act now is much more protective for pregnant employees
If you work for a small employer in Connecticut, and your employer isn't being flexible with you during your pregnancy, isn't allowing you to sit down occasionally, or to take time to go to doctors, or to take a maternity leave; or when you come back from maternity leave, to express milk at work for your baby - all of this is now required by the Connecticut Human Rights Law with regard to your sex and your pregnancy.
NYS Sexual Harassment Law 2018 Revisions
Even if there is only one employee, one 1099 employee and that's you, and you are being sexually harassed, you can fight back. Also under the same new revised law, effective July 2018, mandatory arbitration will no longer be mandatory for sexual harassment claims in New York.
Can I be fired for something I didn't do?
Only if the real reason is based on the illegal factors embodied in the federal or state discrimination laws, then you got some leverage to hold your employer accountable.
It's all about the complaint...
If you are dealing with harassment in the workplace, very important that you complain to your employer. Give them a chance to investigate your allegations of gender discrimination, or harassment based on your race, color, pregnancy, national origin - it doesn't matter. The point is, that you have to give the employer, the company, the opportunity to fix it.
NY now permits sexual harassment claims against small employers
If you are being sexually harassed and you work for an employer in New York, it doesn't matter now how small your employer is. Even if there is only one employee, and you’re that employee, and you're experiencing unwanted sexual attention - any kind of sexualizing conduct, or sexist hostility - you can now hold your employer accountable. And, if you prevail, you are entitled to your attorney fees for holding their feet to the fire.